Jacques Barzun offers 20 principles for good writing in Simple and Direct: A Rhetoric for Writers:
- Have a point and make it by means of the best word.
- Weed out the jargon.
- Look for all fancy wordings and get rid of them.
- Make sure you know not only the meaning but also the bearing of the words you use.
- Consult your second thoughts about slang, euphemisms, and “what everybody says,” so as to make your diction entirely your own choice.
- Respect the integrity of set phrases, partitives, clichés, and complex modifiers.
- Ideas connected in reality require words similarly linked, by nearness or by suitable linking words.
- For a plain style, avoid everything that can be called roundabout—in idea, in linking, or in expression.
- Agreement is as pleasant in prose as it is in personal relations, and no more difficult to work for.
- Cling to your meaning. The tense or mood of a verb in a linked pair can destroy it.
- Do not borrow plumes.
- To be plain and straightforward, resist equally the appeal of old finery and the temptation of smart novelties.
- The mark of a plain tone is combined lucidity and force.
- Trifles matter in two ways: magnified, they lead to pedantry; overlooked, they generate nonsense.
- Make fewer words do more work by proper balance, matching parts, and tight construction.
- Worship no images and question the validity of all.
- In each portion of the work, begin from a point clear to you and the reader and move forward without wobble or meander.
- The writing of a sentence is finished only when the order of the words cannot be changed without damage to the thought or its visibility.
- In whatever paragraphs or essays you write, verify the sequence of ideas and take out or transpose everything that interrupts the march of thought and feeling.
- Read and revise, reread and revise, keep reading and revising until your text seems adequate to your thought.
For more from Barzun, see my post, Jacques Barzun’s 10-point Checklist for Revising Your Prose.
